Oxford University Press The Etherized Wife: Privilege and Power in Sex Therapy Discourse

The Etherized Wife seeks to provide a comprehensive examination of the evolution of sex therapy through the prism of gender. It focuses, in particular, on how sex therapists "treat" women's sexual problems, arguing that these practices have actually enshrined male sexuality and supremacy by advocating for heterosexual intercourse as the pinnacle of a healthy sex life. It holds that in sex, like other domains of life in which men set the standard of normality, women have been judged normal to the degree they match men's expectations. To support these claims, Margolin maps a series of case studies drawn from the sex therapy literature--the articles and books that have been, and continue to be treated as exemplar's of the discipline's collective consciousness. Through examination of case studies which focus on discrepancies in sexual desire, where the male partner wants more sex and the female wants less, the book shows how therapists have favored the male's side. The Etherized Wife shows how the sex therapy discipline has upheld male sexuality as the model of normal, natural, healthy sexuality. Review This is a book everyone should read because it addresses common misconceptions concerning sexual desire. I think anyone who reads the book ― if they really think about the content―will be changed in how they view sexuality including their own. ― Eileen Gambrill, Professor of the Graduate School, School of Social Welfare, University of California at BerkeleyIn The Etherized Wife, Les Margolin offers brilliant, pro-feminist insights into the role of sex therapy in reinforcing normative sex roles through its entrenched imposition of phallogocentric standards on women's sexuality. Lucidly written, deeply theorized, historically grounded, and analytically adept, this book signals a welcome and radical paradigm shift in counseling therapy, theories of sexuality, and feminist studies - one with the potential for a progressive transformation, not just of therapeutic practice, but of society. ― Meenakshi Gigi Durham, University of Iowa About the Author Leslie Margolin is a professor of rhetoric, sexuality, and counselling at the University of Iowa. Margolin's previous books include Goodness Personified: The Emergence of Gifted Children and Under the Cover of Kindness: The Invention of Social Work.